Harriet the hog finds her way home

By Christine Good and Samantha Farley

Harriet the hog was very sad.

She had been captured from her

home in Spain, and had been

brought to America. Although

America was nice, she wanted to

be with her family. So she decid-

ed to find a way to get back

home. She thought for a long

time, but couldn’t think of any-

thing.

Harriet was hungry and lost, so she de-cided to put aside the problem of getting back to her family for a while, and started to sniff out something to eat. Eventually, she came across some yummy looking

eggs just laying on the ground.

Just as she bent down to gather them, she heard a loud chirping noise that scared

her. It was a bird. “Don’t eat my babies, please, it will disrupt the energy flow in our ecosystem,” said the bird. However Harriet

was starving, so she ate them anyway. Leaving the nest behind her, she continued

on her way.

She was still a little hungry, so she started

looking for more food. She came across a

large farm. She decided that a feast of roots

would be delicious, and so she dug up a lot

of the plants for food. Then she saw the

farmer coming. He started yelling, so she

ran.

Now that her belly was full, she could think of

a way to get to Spain. She thought about the

options. Since she had to cross the ocean, she

couldn’t walk. And since the ocean was so vast,

she couldn't swim. So she decided she needed

a boat.

Unfortunately Harriet didn’t own a boat. But

she knew some of the villagers did. So she de-

cided to ask the villagers if she could borrow

one.

When she got to the village, she noticed a lot

of people were giving her an evil look. Some

even seemed to be avoiding her. She decided

to ignore this hostile behavior, and continued

on her quest.

The first house she came too looked very fancy.

The people there looked rich. “They would proba-

bly have a boat”, Harried decided. She knocked

on the door. The man who answered took one

look at Harriet and slammed it shut. Harriet de-

cided that he must have had a bad day.

At the next house, the same thing happened.

Harriet decided that he too had had a bad day.

She kept on going. But at every house she went

to, they were all as uninviting as the first. She

sadly started back towards her home

As she walked along, she noticed a small boy

from the village watching her. She asked him

why the village was so rude, and he told her it

was because she dug up the farms. “Oh,” she

said, and continued walking.

After walking a while, she came upon a poor

looking hut, ready to collapse any minute. She

knocked on the door. A voice from inside

called out “Come in”. She entered, and the

first thing she saw was a poorly dressed man.

He had a long, shaggy beard, and his hair was

rough and tangled. He looked a bit wild, but he

seemed sad.

The man looked at Harriet, and in a grisly voice he

asked, “What do you want?”. Harriet asked him if he

had a boat that he could lend her. He then asked her,

“Why do you want it?”. Harriet told him about her

family in Spain. The man then told her that he was

originally from Spain, and he too wished to go back.

Harriet asked the man why he hadn’t gone back.

He told her about how the boat he had needed

two people to operate it. Harriet asked if she

could help. He said that he had never heard of a

pig helping on a boat, but it seemed possible.

Harriet and the man planned to leave at once. They gathered all of their belongings,

and then they boarded the boat.

As they set off on their voyage, Harriet realized

that she did not know the man’s name. So she

asked. “My name is Malcolm”, he said. For a

while there was an awkward silence on the boat.

To break the silence, Harriet asked Malcolm how

he had gotten to America. He took a deep breath

and started on his story.

He told about getting on the boat to America in-

stead of the one to Greenland, where he was go-

ing to visit his cousins. He told of how he didn’t

have enough money to get back to Spain on the

boat. And he told about how the only boat he

could find was the two person one they were

using.

With Malcolm telling his story, the journey seemed

short. Harriet decided that it was one of the best sto-

ries she had ever heard. She felt the journey was over

too soon.

Finally they arrived in Spain. They docked their

boat, and Harriet let out a big “Yeee Haa!”

because she was so happy to be home again.

After they both found their family they went on

with life. However, they always stayed friends af-

ter that and always helped one another out.

And that’s the story of how Harriet

found her way home.

The End